


My Darling, I'll Find You- Discontinued

by AlexSW97



Series: I Swear This Was Supposed To Be Happy [2]
Category: Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare, Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Drama, F/F, F/M, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide attempt, Kidnapping, M/M, Multi, POV Multiple, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Harm
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-15
Updated: 2016-06-15
Packaged: 2018-07-15 05:17:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7209389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexSW97/pseuds/AlexSW97
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Max can't breathe. His brother was taken by their abuser, and Max let it happen. It's all his fault, and he can't breath.<br/>Jace is left to play the big brother, and the lines between right and wrong aren't very clear anymore.<br/>Alec just watched Magnus get thrown into the ocean, and his whole world fell apart in the blink of an eye.<br/>And Magnus, well Magnus is twenty feet under the water with his hands tied behind his back.  </p><p>Sequel to Fake Date Me, Alexander! If you haven't read that, this won't make any sense, so I suggest you go read that first!</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Darling, I'll Find You- Discontinued

**Author's Note:**

> Hi okay, so this is up! Here you go you guys! 
> 
> First and foremost, I just want to reach out to everyone who was affected by the Pulse nightclub shooting this weekend. It's been extremely triggering and anxiety inducing for me, and I can only imagine many of you are going through the same thing. My condolences go out to the families and friends of the victims. I love each and every one of you very much, and I hope you're all safe <3 If anyone needs someone to talk to, you can find me on tumblr as stuttering-lightwood or twitter as deanstylinson or instagram as alexsw97.
> 
> Also- tags will be updated as I write, so make sure you check those before each chapter.  
> This is written in multiple POVs, and Max's might be slightly triggering in this first chapter once Jace leaves the room and he is left on his own. (Panic attack, self harm, mention of suicidal past) Ends after the full line of --------.

Alec and Magnus had been in the bathroom for twenty minutes now, and Max was starting to get suspicious. He looked down at the lobster on his plate, his appetite vanishing completely. He pushed his plate away, rising shakily from the table. “I- uh.” He glanced around the table, meeting Jace’s calculating eyes. “I’m not feeling too well, I think I’m gonna go to bed.”

“You look pale, kiddo. I’ll walk you to bed, make sure you don’t pass out or anything on the way,” Jace suggested, getting to his feet as well. 

“I’m fine, Jace,” Max argued, walking away from the table. Jace followed him out into the warm sea breeze. “Seriously Jace, go back in there. I can walk back to my room.”

“I know exactly what you’re doing, Max. Don’t think Alec didn’t warn me,” Jace said. Max stared at him with wide eyes. There was _ no way _ Alec had told Jace their plan. Max couldn’t believe that Jace was on board with it.

“Jace. There’s instruction on my bed for you, I’m sorry, but I need to go with them. Just follow the instructions and everything will be fine. Make sure you don’t get caught, you can get life in prison for hacking a government computer,” Max explained hurriedly while backing away from Jace. Jace’s eyebrows drew together, confusion written all over his face. 

“What the hell are you talking about?” Jace asked. Max gulped, hoping he hadn’t said too much. “Is this like- are Alec and Magnus role playing a videogame with you?” 

“No- yes- you- just go follow those instructions, okay?” Max begged, heading toward the market, just like they had discussed. Jace walked behind him, obviously not into whatever story Max was making up. 

“Alec told me not to let you go find them, that they were planning a surprise for you, and to keep you away from them.”

“Yeah,” Max agreed, thinking fast. “A surprise ambush. If I can find them now, I can win.” Jace looked convinced, slowing his pace down. 

“Okay- So I just follow the instru-”

“Magnus!” It was Alec, voice carrying from the trees past the market. “Leave him alone! Let him go, if he’s not important!” Jace grabbed Max’s arm, stopping him in his tracks.

“Please tell me that’s part of your game.” Max shook his head, running in the direction of Alec’s voice. Jace was hot on his heels, quickly gaining the lead. “What the fuck is going on- Alec!” He called, running faster. Max pushed himself to keep up with Jace, his mind dazed with panic. 

“Magnus!” Max yelled, tearing into the trees. They pushed past bushes and tree trunks, not caring if they got hurt or not. Max burst through a group of trees, Jace’s arm grabbing him around the stomach. In front of them, a helicopter was taking off from the ground, and Max could clearly see a few rainbow streaks of hair through the window. “Fuck!” He yelled, falling to his knees.

“What the hell is going on, Max?” Jace asked, watching the helicopter rise into the air. Max’s heart was racing, falling forward onto his hands. 

“No, no, no,” he mumbled, tears clouding his eyes. Jace was pulling out his phone beside him, looking panicked. 

“I’m calling the police. Did you know this was going to-”

“No.” Max wrestled the phone out of Jace’s hands, tossing it off to the side. “You can’t call the cops Jace, please.”

“Max you need to tell me what’s going on,” Jace said slowly, watching as the helicopter disappeared from view. “Max, Alec and Magnus were just kidnapped and taken away in a helicopter. Why can’t I call the police?”

“That’s- it’s the government! They took them, and I need to track them. Fuck, I shouldn’t have waited so long to go looking for them,” Max mumbled to himself, walking through the trees again.

“Stop swearing!” Jace called after him, struggling to keep up. “Are you high or something? Did Alec give you drugs?” Max ignored him, sprinting towards the resort as soon as he cleared the trees. “Max, stop!” Jace grabbed his arm, nearly knocking him off balance. 

“I’ll explain in a minute, we need to get back to the hotel room, now!” Max yelled, running off toward the resort again. Jace followed, the stream of questions never stopping. Max wanted to scream, how could they just leave him behind like that? He wasn’t a little kid. 

They burst into the hotel room that Max and Jace were now sharing- something about Izzy and Clary wanting a sleepover, again. Max ran straight for the bed, grabbing his laptop and frantically opening the tracking program. Jace snatched the papers off the bed, reading the instructions with wide eyes. 

“That’s the guy who took Alec? How do you know who he is? Does Alec remember who he is? What does Magnus have to do with this? Wait, Magnus has a sister?” Jace asked, flipping through the papers. Max focused on the two dots in the air, zooming in on them far enough that he could see they were touching, or very very close. 

“Alec remembers everything that happened to him. It was really traumatizing, and he’s only told Magnus and I-”

“Why’d he tell you?”

“Because I told him that my third grade teacher did something to me, and my teacher ended up being the same guy who took Alec and did the same thing to him eleven years earlier,” Max said, eyes focused on the red dots of the GPS as he tried to track a possible place they were headed.

“What did he do to you?”

“What do you think creepy old men do to little boys, Jace?” Max snapped, watching as the red dot with the ‘M’ over it was pulled away from the ‘A’. Jace was silent for a moment, and Max wondered if he’d passed out.  _ Would be less of a distraction _ , he thought to himself.

“Who else knows?” Jace asked quietly, looking over Max’s shoulder to watch the dots himself.

“No one. Just the four of us.” Max watched carefully as ‘M’ was dragged as far from ‘A’ as he suspected the could be in the helicopter. 

“So those are them? Magnus and Alec?” Max started to respond, when the ‘M’ started to fall from the air plummeting toward the ocean. 

“Oh my God,” Max yelled, helpless to the situation in hand. He watched ‘M’ fall below the surface line, sinking deeper into the ocean. “No- Magnus. Oh, God.” The ‘A’ was moving toward the side of the helicopter that ‘M’ had fallen from, and Max’s heart caught in his throat. 

“What’s- why’s Magnus down there? Shouldn’t he be up by Alec?” Max shook his head, his hand over his mouth as the ‘A’ was jerked away from that side of the helicopter. 

The ‘M’ continued to sink slowly, showing no sign of trying to reach the surface.  _ My fault, my fault, my fault.  _ Max repeated in his head, staring at the red dot. “Max, is that- is he in the water?”

Max didn’t respond. He  _ couldn’t.  _ He’d led them right into this. Magnus was drowning right in front of his eyes, and Alec was being taken somewhere  _ alone _ .  _ You screwed up Max, _ he thought to himself.  _ Once again, you’re a terrible person who can’t do anything right. Now you’ve gone and got your brother’s boyfriend killed. _

“Was the GPS in something? Could it have fallen? He can’t be-” Jace cut himself off, biting his lip. Max sighed, holding up his bracelet. 

“It was in his bracelet Jace, I don’t think it just fell out of the helicopter by itself. I mean did you see the way Alec lunged after him? He’s dead Jace.” It came out harsher than anticipated, but it was the hard truth, and Jace needed to hear it. 

“I’m calling the police!” Jace said, grabbing the landline from the bedside table. Max lunged at him, pinning him to the bed.

“You can’t Jace. The government is running this thing, so the police won’t help you.” 

“Max, I don’t-”

“I’m going to jail if you call them. At least let me finish the plan. I just need twenty minutes once Alec gets to wherever they’re going, and then you can call and get me arrested.”

“Max, that’s not-” Jace started, but Max cut him off. 

“Jace please, twenty minutes. He’s dead either way.” 

“Don’t say that,” Jace snapped, clearly getting worked up. 

“I think you need to take a walk,” Max suggested, looking somberly at the computer screen. Jace huffed out a sigh, shoving Max off of him and storming toward the door. 

“Twenty minutes!” He called, slamming the door behind him. Max started typing away at the computer again, disconnecting Magnus’s GPS so that he didn’t need to look at it any longer. He pushed his computer away, flopping back on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. 

_ Keep it together, Max _ , he thought to himself, knowing full well he  _ had _ to finish this part of the plan.  _ For Magnus _ , he told himself.

His breath caught in his throat and every ounce of panic and pain he’d been holding back since he got out of the hospital was hitting him at once. He gasped, hands clenching into fists as he sat up. He felt his nails digging into his palm, but he didn’t care. He deserved it. He deserved all of it. 

He slid off the bed, his breathing coming in short gasps. He stumbled to the washroom, pushing the door open and falling through, just barely catching himself on the counter. The sharp air passing through his mouth was creating a tingling sensation on his teeth, one that made him feel sick to his stomach. 

He leaned his forearms on the counter, resting his head against the cool marbled.  _ Breathe _ , he told himself, his nails digging harder into his skin. Magnus was  _ dead _ . He didn’t even want to go out there, and now he was the one dead. Max dropped his head against the counter again, a sharp pain radiating from the impact site. 

“How could you be so stupid?” He muttered to himself, his vision starting to blur with tears. He slammed his eyes closed, trying to take deeper breaths to calm himself. If anything, it just made it worse. 

He let out a noise of frustration, spinning around and sinking to the floor. The knob on the cupboard dug into his shoulder, but he could care less. Images of Magnus flashed through his mind, smiling, dancing, reading with him. It hurt. It physically hurt, and he needed a release. 

He unclenched his fists, bringing his hands to the opposite shoulder and dragging his nails over his skin. He watched the beads of blood appear in the long white scratches. He gasped at the feeling, the air stinging against the cuts. Five long, white scrapes down each arm. 

_ Magnus is dead. You killed him. You’re a murderer Max. You should be the one dead, not Magnus.  _

“Stop,” he whispered to himself, choking on the tears he hadn’t realised were flowing freely down his face. He rubbed his palm over his arm, smearing the blood across his skin.  _ Your fault.  _ “Stop,” he repeated, louder this time. 

_ You killed Magnus. If you’d killed yourself properly, he wouldn’t have been on that helicopter. He wouldn’t be in this mess. He’d still be alive. _

“Stop!” Max choked on his words, pulling his hair as hard as he could. He heard the door slam open out in the main room, but it barely registered in his mind. Magnus was dead, and Alec was going to hate him. 

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jace slammed the door behind him, storming out of the room he was now sharing with Max. His mind was whirling, trying desperately to process all the information at once. Alec  _ remembered.  _ It happened to Max too. Alec had been kidnapped. And Magnus- Magnus was laying on the bottom of the ocean. 

Jace made it five steps before every emotion he’d ever known hit him like a shit ton of bricks. He gasped, his knees knocking against the stone floor. His blunt fingernails scraped at the small stones in the crevices on the floor. The tears came like a tidal wave, splashing onto the floor beneath him. He wanted to scream, to cry out, to bring them back, but he couldn’t. 

Magnus was dead. Jace had just watched Magnus fall from a helicopter and drown. Alec was gone- kidnapped, and Jace was suddenly the older brother. He thought back to Max, how determined he’d been, how he just wanted to help. Alec would kill him for storming out of the room and leaving Max alone.

His mind went to the day they found Max bleeding out on the floor. It made sense now, more or less, why he had done it. It made sense when Alec was so diligent about everything that happened during that time, why he was  _ so  _ much more affected. 

Jace climbed to his feet, steadying himself against the wall. Alec was gone now, and Jace needed to be there for Max. He needed to adopt Alec’s role as the caring one, until they could get him back. He walked toward the room again, ready to face the situation and help Max through it, just as Alec would.

Jace slid the key into the lock, wiping away the last of his goddamn tears. He pushed the door open, expecting to see Max typing away at the computer. The bed was empty, but the bathroom door was open, the light spilling into the moonlight room. 

“Stop!” Max shouted from the bathroom, his voice panic ridden. Jace pushed the door open the rest of the way, hearing it crash into the wall, and tore towards the bathroom. He slid around the corner, ready to fight whoever was attacking Max, but was fully relieved to find Max alone. 

His knees were pulled up to his chest, head resting on his knees. His arms were bleeding, long, white scratches running from his shoulders to his forearms. His body was shaking, a mixture of sobs and short, barely there breaths. 

He spotted the blood streaked across Max’s arms and sunk to his knees, crawling over to him. “Hey Maxy,” he whispered, placing his hands on Max’s and untangling them from his hair. “You’re okay buddy. I got you.” 

“I killed him,” Max sobbed, looking desperate and panicked. He clenched and unclenched his fists, as if he wanted to drag them down his arms again. 

“Did you push him out of the helicopter?” Jace asked, pulling at Max’s arms which were fighting to get close to his skin again. 

“It doesn’t matter Jace, I made him go out there! Now he’s dead and Alec’s going to hate me!” Max’s body crumpled, the tension falling from every muscle as he let his tears consume him. Jace pulled him into his arms, hugging him as tightly as possible. 

“Max, I need you to listen to me very carefully.” Jace took a deep breath, trying to collect his thoughts. “I’m still so confused about this whole thing. I don’t think I understand the half of it. I think you and Alec are scared. I think the things that happened to you in the past, are affecting your judgement, and I think those things did a number on your mental health. I think Magnus just wanted Alec to be happy, and I think when Alec told him what happened, his judgement was clouded with anger, and a longing to find his sister. 

I think you three made some pretty fucked up decisions, and I don’t think any of you were in a state to make those decisions, and because of that, you couldn’t see any other way of getting what you wanted. As I said, I think i’m still missing half of what’s going on here, but I know one thing for sure. I know Magnus’s death was not your fault. I know that no one is going to blame you for that. He’s an adult, and he knew the risks when he went out there. When we get Alec back, he’s going to be upset, but the last thing he’s going to do is blame you, because it’s not your fault.”

“Jace, Mom’s going to kill me,” Max whispered into Jace’s shoulder. “How do I tell her?” 

“You don’t. I will tell her Max. Don’t worry about it right now, let’s just go find out where Alec is, and save all those kids.” 

\------------

An hour and a half after they had watched the helicopter take off, it finally landed in some area of the states Jace couldn’t identify. He watched as ‘A’ was taken away from where they touched down, and was lead about ten feet away. Max’s program should the shadow of a building, but there wasn’t any detail, other than obvious divisions for different floors. 

As soon as ‘A’ was taken inside the shadow, Max started typing away, eyebrows drawn together in concentration. Jace felt like he was living in a spy movie, a box popping up on the side of the screen, random letters unscrambling into fully formed words. He watched in awe as Max worked, the word coming up as names, addresses, and phone numbers. 

“Is that them? Is that all the kids they took?” Jace asked, staring at the hundreds and hundreds of names.

“It’s all the names of anyone they put in their system under the age of eighteen at time of entry,” Max explained, splitting his computer screen and pulling up his email. 

“Can’t you narrow it down? And maybe not use your personal email? What if some of those emails don’t work anymore?” Jace asked, watching as Max pasted all the emails into the BCC box on his email. “Can you even email that many people at once?” 

“We’re working with what we’ve got Jace. And I’m sure the government keeps contact information up to date.” Max started typing a message to all the people, trying to explain who he was, and what was going on. “What am I supposed to tell them? Watch your backs and don’t call the police because they don’t care?”

“Just tell them what you know. Tell them your brother was taken by them again, and you don’t know why they came back for them. Mention his name, in case anyone recognises him, and tell them to be careful,” Jace suggested, not really knowing what to say himself. 

Ten minutes later, the email was crafted, Max’s mouse hovering over the send button. Jace squeezed his shoulder, lost for words that would make this situation any better. Max nodded, pressing the button. No more than thirty seconds later, the email popped up in Max’s inbox, and Jace’s phone went off. He opened his email, finding it had been sent to him as well. 

“Why am I in their system? I wasn’t kidnapped as a child.”

“I wasn’t either,” Max pointed out, shutting his computer. “Now what?”

“Now we get Alec back. Alive.”

**Author's Note:**

> Don't forget to let me know what you guys think- your comments are the best part of my day! I love you all, thanks to all of you who have stuck with this thing! I'll try to update as often as I can, summer is a really busy time of year for me, so it's not going to be twice a week like part one, that's for sure!
> 
> Hey guys, not an update, but I just wanted to let you all know this story probably won't be touched until the fall, I know you guys are so excited but I literally haven't been able to finish the next chapter since May because I've somehow got a full time job, a social life, and a very lovely boy on the go right now! Love you all thank you so moch for every kind thing you guys say, I promise I will finish this!!


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